How do social casinos work?
Social casinos are hugely popular in the US for players who live in states where real money gaming isn’t allowed. So how are they different from traditional casinos? Well, the main difference is that rather than using real money to play slots and table games, you’ll use virtual currencies instead. Most of these virtual currencies are called Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins. Some sites will have their own unique names for them, but the properties are the same.
Gold Coins are the main virtual currency used at social casinos and they have no actual monetary value. Gold Coins are used for fun and you will have the option to purchase them if you choose to. You’ll always get some for free through the welcome bonus and other promotions, but some players choose to get more through Gold Coin packages.
Sweeps Coins are different as they can be used in sweepstakes mode to play the same games as Gold Coins. But the key difference with these is that you can’t purchase them, they can only be won through gameplay or claimed through bonuses. And are you ready for the best part? When you win Sweeps Coins through gameplay you’ll have the opportunity to redeem them for real money prizes. However, there are a few conditions that you must meet to do this.
The main one is the playthrough requirements which usually require you to play your Sweeps Coins through at least once before they’re eligible for redemption. Also, you’ll need to reach a minimum number of eligible Sweeps Coins which can be anywhere from 10 to 100 depending on the site. The way that you choose to redeem your Sweeps Coins for real money prizes also affects the number that you’ll need, usually it’s lower for gift cards and higher for bank transfer.
Get up to 500K Gold Coins + 105 FREE SC + 1000 VIP points
625K Golden Coins + Up to 125 SC FREE + 1250 VIP Points
25 Stake Cash + 560K Gold Coins + 3.5% Rakeback
How to collect Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins
When it comes to playing casino-style games at social casinos, you’ll need to have Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins to play with. There are a few ways that you can get these and generally it’s by claiming a range of new sweepstakes bonuses. The key bonuses are welcome offers, daily reloads, referral programs, social media giveaways and the mail-in bonus. Let’s take a look at how each one of these works now.
Welcome bonus
The welcome bonus is probably the easiest one to claim and it’s also the main that every new social casino will have. The reason for this is that all social casinos are free-to-play which means that they have to provide a certain amount of Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins to new players. This is great news for you because it means that you’ll always have some virtual currencies to explore the game libraries with. The size of the welcome bonus can vary quite significantly between sites, with some social casinos offering quite a large bonus while others offer a smaller one. Often new social casinos will have smaller welcome bonuses compared to more established sites, but this isn’t necessarily a hard and fast rule.
Claiming the welcome bonus is straightforward and just involves signing up through one of my links. There may be a few steps involved like verifying your email address, but this is the case when you sign up to any site. Some new social casinos will ask you to complete a few additional steps like completing your site profile, or linking your Facebook account for instance. But again, this will vary from site to site.
Daily login bonus
Many new social casinos offer a daily login bonus as a way to boost your virtual currency balance each day. So how does it work? Well, when you login to your account daily, you’ll be able to claim a few Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins. Just like with the welcome bonus, the amount of virtual currencies you receive will depend very much on the platform you choose. For example, RealPrize offers a daily login bonus of 1,500 Gold Coins and 0.3 Sweeps Coins and LoneStar Casino offers a daily login bonus of 5,000 Gold Coins and 0.3 Sweeps Coins. This means the amount of Sweeps Coins offered is the same, but the number of Gold Coins offered is a bit different.
Something to keep an eye out for is progressive daily login bonuses. These are quite exciting as it means that the number of Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins you claim each day increases the more you login. With these types of bonuses you do need to login consistently each day and if you miss a day, your streak will reset. I find the habit of logging in each day and claiming your bonus, whether you plan to play or not, is a great way to ensure that you always have virtual currencies to play with.
Refer-a-friend bonus
This bonus is exactly what it sounds like, it’s a bonus that you can claim when you refer your friends and family to a new social casino. Every time someone signs up to a site using your referral code or unique referral link, then you’ll be rewarded with some Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins. These bonuses can be quite generous, sometimes offering up to 200,000 Gold Coins and 60 free Sweeps Coins.
However, one thing to note is that they sometimes have conditions attached. For example, some new social casinos will require the referred players to make optional Gold Coins package purchases for you to claim the full referral bonus. Of course, any purchases are always completely optional, but it’s just something to be aware of.
Social media giveaways
If you enjoy being on social media then this bonus could be for you. Many new social casinos are quite active across social media platforms and often have a variety of running promos each week. Most of the time, all you’ll need to do to enter is to complete a few ‘call to actions’ such as liking, commenting or sharing a post.
The amount of virtual currencies can vary dramatically, but they tend to be higher around holidays. For example, there have been quite a few Halloween-themed giveaways lately. One that I saw was offering 75,000 Gold Coins and 15 Sweeps Coins for three players and all you had to do to win was comment on the post. So it can definitely be a fun and easy way to claim a bunch of virtual currencies. And the more you have, the more casino-style games you can play.
Pros and cons - New social casinos
- Free to play
- Hundreds of casino-style games
- Mobile play available
- Not available in all states
Our top five new social casinos
Now that I’ve explained a little bit about how social casinos work, it’s about time that I take you through some of my favorite sites. There are a huge number of social casinos available nowadays so it can be a bit overwhelming when it comes to choosing one to sign up to. Which site you choose will largely depend on the factors that are the most important to you. For example, if you really want to be able to spin the reels on the go, then a social casino that has a downloadable app may be preferable. Or if you really want a diverse game collection, then the number and variety of slots available will be important for you to look at.
| Social casino | Welcome bonus | Daily login bonus | No. of games |
| RealPrize | 100,000 Gold Coins + 2 Sweeps Coins | 1,500 Gold Coins + 0.3 Sweeps Coins | 700+ |
| Sweeps Royal | 50,000 Gold Coins + 1 Sweeps Coin | Varying number of GC + SC | 3,000+ |
| Dara Casino | 100,000 Gold Coins + 2 Sweeps Coins | Up to 2,000 Gold Coins + 0.7 Sweeps Coins | 120+ |
| LoneStar Casino | 100,000 Gold Coins + 2.5 Sweeps Coins | 5,000 Gold Coins + 0.3 Sweeps Coins | 500+ |
| Jackpota | 7,500 Gold Coins + 2.5 Sweeps Coins | 1,500 Gold Coins + 0.2 Sweeps Coins | 700+ |
RealPrize: Explore a range of table games
- 700+ casino style games
- Two different gameplay modes
- Mobile friendly website
- Tons of promos
- Only VIPs get live chat
RealPrize is a popular social casino with hundreds of slots and even some table games available to play. You’ll find all the classic casino offerings here like Texas Hold’em, Blackjack and even video poker. But instead of using real money, you can play all of these games with virtual currencies. You can play for free too by signing up through the page banners and claiming the welcome bonus of 100,000 Gold Coins and 2 Sweeps Coins.
Remember when I mentioned earlier that some new social casinos have steps to complete for the welcome offers? Well, RealPrize is one of them! It’s very simple though, you just need to verify both your email address and your phone number. Once you’ve done this, you’ll unlock the full welcome bonus. You can then start exploring the entire game library and collect the 1,500 Gold Coins and 0.3 Sweeps Coins daily login bonus every day.
Sweeps Royal: Over 3,000 casino-style games
- 3,000+ games
- Regular purchase promos
- 24/7 customer service
- No mobile app
- Relatively low welcome promo
Sweeps Royal is a fairly new social casino with over 3,000 casino-style games to explore. This is a HUGE game library, and by far the biggest game collection of any of my recommended sites. So, if it's the variety you’re looking for, this could be the site for you. This includes over 20 fishing games which are super fun and my favorites include King Octopus, The Deep Monster, 1942 and Genie.
And guess what? You can play these for free by claiming the welcome bonus. Despite the huge game library, Sweeps Royal also the smallest welcome bonus of the sites in my list. When you sign up you can grab 50,000 Gold Coins and 1 Sweeps Coins. You can boost this with the daily login bonus, but the exact number of virtual currencies you can claim will change a bit each day.
Dara Casino: Claim the progressive daily login bonus
- Generous welcome bonus
- Redeem SC winnings for cash
- Legal in most US states
- No live chat or telephone support
- No dedicated mobile app
Dara Casino is another new social casino that’s worth considering if you enjoy sites that offer a range of slots, fishing games and jackpot slots. This site does has a small game collection with around 120 games to choose from. Despite the small number, the diversity is fairly impressive with some popular titles including Crazy 777 and Mayan Empire.
New players can grab a welcome bonus of 100,000 Gold Coins and 2 Sweeps Coins when you sign up through the page banners. There’s no mobile app that I could find, but all the games are optimized for mobile play. So, if you’d like to play on the go simply load up the site in your mobile browser and enjoy. Whether you’re on your desktop or your phone you’ll be able to enjoy all of your favorite games and claim the progressive daily login bonus. On the first day you’ll claim 500 Gold Coins and 0.1 Sweeps Coins. Then if you login for the whole week, this will climb up to 2,000 Gold Coins and 0.7 Sweeps Coins.
LoneStar Casino: Download the mobile app
- Over 500 games
- Frequent promos and bonuses
- Table games and video poker offered
- No live casino games
LoneStar Casino is a fairly new social casino but that doesn’t mean that it should be left off this list. Despite being a new site, LoneStar Casino is the only social casino in my list of recommended sites that has a downloadable mobile app. This is available for both Apple and Android devices, so you can spin on the go. Right now, you can choose from over 500 games which have all been optimized to work on mobile and desktop.
If you’d like to play for free, simply sign up through the page banners and claim the welcome bonus of 100,000 Gold Coins and 2.5 Sweeps Coins. You won’t need any kind of promo code to claim this offer, so in a few minutes you can be spinning the reels on the go. And if you find you want to keep your virtual currency balance boosted, you can login daily to claim the reload bonus of 5,000 Gold Coins and 0.3 Sweeps Coins.
Jackpota: Play progressive jackpot slots
- Over 700 games including slots, blackjack, and Slingo
- Daily rewards and active social media giveaways
- Social Jackpots add variety to regular play
- 24/7 support with a dedicated US help number
- Not available in several US states
As the name implies, Jackpota is a fantastic social casino that’s well known for offering a huge range of progressive jackpot slots. You can win one of four jackpot virtual currency prizes: Grand, Major, Minor, Mini. Any spin could be the one to land you a jackpot and if it happens to be the Grand jackpot, you could get up to 200M Gold Coins or 100,000 Sweeps Coins. You could even win these jackpots without any Gold Coin package purchases by claiming the welcome bonus.
When you sign up as a new player you’ll grab a welcome bonus of 7,500 Gold Coins and 2.5 Sweeps Coins, no social casino promo code required. You can use these virtual currencies to play any of the 18 progressive jackpot slots. And to keep your gameplay going make sure you login every day to claim the daily reload bonus. This will give you an additional 1,500 Gold Coins and 0.2 Sweeps Coins every 24 hours.
How to sign up to new social casinos
If you’re thinking that you’d like to sign up to one of my recommended new social casinos, then let’s take a look at how to do that. The procedure is relatively straightforward and similar to how you can sign up for social sportsbooks. To help you out I’ve written this handy step-by-step guide:
- Click on any of the page banners on this page for your chosen sweepstakes casino. You’ll find the most up to date details for the welcome offer here too because sometimes they can change.
- There will usually be a ‘Sign Up’ or ‘Join’ button in the top right hand corner, if you click on this then the registration form will launch.
- You can either sign up manually or some sites will let you jump straight in with your Facebook, Google, or Apple account.
- You’ll still need to confirm your birth date and address to ensure that you meet the minimum age requirements and are located in a legal state. Some new social casinos are legal in more states than others so always check the site T&Cs if you’re unsure.
- Read and accept the T&Cs, then hit submit.
Click the enclosed link in your emails to verify your account and your welcome bonus will be automatically awarded. However, you may need to complete a few steps to unlock the full bonus. Another thing to consider is that many new social casinos will require all players to complete a KYC verification process. This confirms your identity and usually involves uploading some official identification documents. Not all sites will require you to do this straight away, however, it can be a good idea to get it out of the way.
As I mentioned earlier, Sweeps Coins can be redeemed for real money prizes once you’ve accumulated enough and met the playthrough requirements. Before you can request a prize redemption, you’ll need to fully verify your account with the KYC process. This can often take a couple of days to be approved so I always recommend doing it as soon as possible. Otherwise, you’ll have to wait a few days for your account to be verified and then wait another few days for your prize redemption to be processed.
Final thoughts on new social casinos
So there you have it, everything you need to know about new social casinos including a few sites that I recommend you check out. If you’re considering which platform to sign up to then you can’t go wrong with either RealPrize, Dara Casino, LoneStar Casino, Sweeps Royal or Jackpota. If you’re looking for the social casino with the biggest game collection then Sweeps Royal could be for you, or if you’d rather sign up to the social casino with the biggest welcome offer then check out LoneStar Casino.
To sign up to your chosen social casino simply click on the page banners and follow the instructions to complete your registration form.
Get off to a great start with these social casino bonuses
Get up to 500K Gold Coins + 105 FREE SC + 1000 VIP points
625K Golden Coins + Up to 125 SC FREE + 1250 VIP Points
25 Stake Cash + 560K Gold Coins + 3.5% Rakeback
Get 84K GC + 42 SC FREE + 77 FREE SC SPINS
Get 227,5K GC + 107.5 SC FREE
New social casino FAQs
What are new social casinos?
Social casinos offer games just like traditional casinos but instead of using real money, players use virtual currencies to play them. All social casinos are free to play, although you can purchase optional Gold Coins packages if you choose to. Also, Sweeps Coins can be redeemed for real money prizes as long as you meet the minimum requirements and play them through at least once.
Can I claim a welcome offer when I sign up to new social casinos?
Yes! All social casinos will offer a welcome bonus when you sign up as part of the free-to-play model. To claim this offer all you need to do is sign up to your chosen site and verify your account.
Can anyone sign up to new social casinos?
You can sign up to social casinos as long as you are at least 18 years old and located in a legal state. Some states have higher age restrictions so make sure that you check the T&Cs. Some social casinos also operate in more legal states than others so it’s worth checking which ones are legal in your state before signing up.
